


Metamorphtale

by Aria Serif (Mysterie), Mysterie



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Metamorphtale, Gen, Metamorphtale Papyrus (Swift), Metamorphtale Sans (Shift), Undertale AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-03
Updated: 2020-06-03
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:48:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 4,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24526390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mysterie/pseuds/Aria%20Serif, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mysterie/pseuds/Mysterie
Relationships: Sans & Kindra, Sans & Papyrus
Kudos: 1





	1. Chapter 1

do you believe in fate?

karma?

i’m not sure if i do or not. sometimes i wonder about my past. i don’t remember much of it, but seeing the

snow fall outside my window, hearing my brother hum to the holiday music... it almost takes me back, to a time i think i

should remember. to a place not unlike this one. . . a place where it’s not kill or be killed exactly, where sometimes no one

knew my name or was glad to have me around. a place where i was a powerless underdog who couldn’t really do anything

and wasn’t even valued by family...

a life that wasn’t blessed entirely like my life now, but wasn’t cursed either. you probably could guess who i am, whoever

you are who is reading this journal. it would be rude though to not introduce myself. my name is shift. that’s just a

nickname though that sort of stuck for some reason, i’m not sure why.

my real name is . . .


	2. Chapter 2

**HOOOOONNNNKKK!**

Startled out of her reverie, the woman in a blue coat and black slacks glanced up from her phone; it wasn’t even honking at her, but it was enough to make her scowl as she pulled the hood of the jacket closer. Green eyes dark enough to almost be brown peered from behind a set of black rims. The holidays were murder, people not watching or not caring. With a huff she put the phone away, stepping off the curb to cross the parking lot towards a black chevy car that had seen better days; the paint was peeling in places, the windshield was cracked on the passenger side, the trunk had some scuff marks, a dent and scrapes on the driver’s side told of an accident years prior where a careless co-worker had backed into it and the radio antenna was long lost from an incident in her younger days.

She took out her keys and was soon on her way home; the one bedroom apartment was barely worth the money she and her roommate paid, it certainly wasn’t as big as she wished it was. Items strewn about in various piles on shelves, making it smaller. She set down her coat on the couch, covering various sacks that were sitting on that end; a makeshift coffee table overflowing with various items. She booted up the pc, the keyboard balanced on a cushion as she began her evening routine online; she wasn’t physically active much but she kept busy with things she did online.

She smiled as she typed a response to a forum post that was a story, a fanfiction about a retro game that had gained fame since its release in 2015 called Undertale. A game with countless fans, where the goal was that there was a choice to either befriend all the monsters or kill them and the ending changed depending on what path was chosen by the player. There hadn’t ever been such a game before and it was now vastly popular with many.

Kindra was one of the countless fans who had created alternate universes, or aus; she adored the main cast and had not had the heart or desire to kill, she had chose the pacifist route rather than - as it was called - the genocide route. Due to her curiosity she had seen a video of the other route and the consequences the game dished out. This game didn’t let a player erase past actions without a complete erasure at the end of the game, called a True Reset.

Something she had only done one time and the game discouraged it but it wasn’t like it remembered after a True Reset anyway. She always kept this information at the back of her mind so that she did not forget the rules that governed the “core world” the game inhabited and was the same underlying base rules for every au that would come into being. There were always base rules for any universe and anyone who said otherwise or refused to follow them was either being selfish, a moron, both or was entirely ignorant on the concept of what an au really was and how existence itself even worked.

Kindra had seen a handful of those who thought they could just do what they wanted and everyone was supposed to accept it as fact or law, a basically ‘I’m right because I say so’ sort of thing - completely childish of course. it just figured that those who did such childish things, who were called human by society, would be - according to law and cultural belief - adults. The only intelligent race on the entire planet and current adults couldn’t be held accountable... or rather couldn’t be bothered to be held accountable for doing or dealing with any unpleasant reality. Too self absorbed to do what they should and do it the right way.

For once in her life - okay if she were honest that was an exaggeration, she’d thought this more than once - she wanted a storybook ending; where evil was punished, the good and just ruled the day and true love conquered all. That wasn’t reality, why couldn’t it be? That was a rhetorical question. Kindra went to bed early that evening because the following morning she had jury duty; something she wasn’t looking forward to. It wasn’t that she minded it, but the pay wasn’t even equal to what she made the evening before in a four hour shift.


	3. Chapter 3

After dressing and downing an energy drink she left the apartment; the near half hour drive wasn’t bad honestly and this was a new experience for her. After parking a couple of blocks away due to change in city arrangement, she braved the cold wind. She didn’t feel anxious or even the slightest bit nervous from this as she had thought she might. After going through a metal detector she went up three flights of stairs to room 303 to check in, joining a line; after a few minutes of standing in line she was handed a questionnaire to fill out.

Kindra wasn’t a people person despite that her job forced her to pretend to be. She hated most of humanity and was rather bitter towards the race as a whole though not so much that she couldn’t be civil, just enough to wish she wasn’t a part of their species due to the atrocities mankind was known for. A species that consisted of members that deserved to be extinct and condemned the race as a whole. The sheer arrogance of the race was enough to make her want to puke.

That was just the tip of the iceberg too. Still, for the first two hours she had managed civil conversation with those who sat next to her; learning a bit about them, not that she really cared or would remember later. Humans had been cruel to her since her youth; she’d been bullied, robbed, ignored, treated like dirt, verbally abused and physically assaulted by her supposed peers just because she “wasn’t like them” ... a common theme in many books she had read in her youth.

Kindra, who had been compassionate, friendly, and loving in her youth was nothing like that now as an adult. She wanted little to nothing to do with humanity as the world had lost its humane aspect over the years. The saying that knowledge was power held true but also the more one knew the less they could feel for a race that was swimming in filth. After a while she fell silent and simply wrote in a book of paper she’d brought along to pass time. A woman came into the room with a clipboard and called names, Kindra was among them.

“If I called your name please come with me.” The group filed out of the room and a second roll call was taken. They were led to a room then where there was a TV and told that they would watch a video before meeting with the jury judge for more details. The room looked like a smaller version of the usual courtrooms seen on TV; thus it was probably safe to assume this room was a courtroom itself that currently had no other use. The video they watched lasted about twenty minutes, Kindra knew most of the information due to her interest in detective shows in her youth; the only thing she actually learned from the video was the rules for the courthouse itself.

Following the video the judge came out in the black robes one expected to see; Kindra shifted positions as her back was aching, she had issues with it and paid a chiropractor forty a month to realign it to get rid of the pain. Her family had a history of it, didn’t help that she’d been overweight most her life. Despite listening carefully to instructions she couldn't bring herself to care much and only hoped she could get a non-murder, non-violent case for the day and be done with this nonsense. There were more productive things she could be doing with her day and it did not help that she’d been told she had to do a call-in on Tuesday for a different trial if not chosen so she would have to possibly come back on Wednesday. With a pay of only 30 dollars per day this wasn’t worth the time spent waiting around.

A thing Kindra didn’t like doing; she couldn’t simply sit still and do nothing, her mind would get bored. She hated it at work and her need to constantly have something to do made her a good fit for the department she worked in most of the time at her job, as there was almost always something to do, provided she wasn’t too sore to do it. After listening to the jury judge, and taking notes for her own benefit, Kindra filed out with the group and they were told what time to be back and who the judge was. Still no information on the case for certain, unless the questionnaire had been about the case, but Kindra didn’t think that was likely.

It had been over a criminal case that, for whatever reason, the guy had been found guilty twice of the crime and yet apparently wanted yet **another** trial. Why anyone wanted such hassle was beyond her, but she thought it was nothing but a waste of time and resources... and wasn’t there a law that kept a person from being tried multiple times for the same crime or was that something that had changed since she’d been a teenager? Regardless, she didn’t think she could be unbiased for something like that and had checked “no” when that question of her being a juror for the case had come up.

“Can I hang around the juror lounge?”

“If you want.” The court assistant - as that is what they called them now instead of bailiffs - replied and so while her fellow jurors departed until the time of the meeting with the judge came she headed inside to the lounge to find a seat. She looked at the analogue clock on the wall opposite of where she’d found a seat.

“Great, I have three hours to kill.” Pulling out the tiny notebook again she began to write once more; the story was coming easily and when she checked the time again she found she still had about two hours. _Well, I’ve killed an hour writing but now I’m starting to run out of ideas on what to write. Perhaps I should take a quick nap, though I don’t think it will be very restful as this chair wasn’t made for it... and now my right side is aching as well as my left despite the stretches I did a moment ago._


	4. Chapter 4

Kindra knew she could leave the lounge but she didn’t want to and she had no money for food on her so that was out of the question; she’d also been forced to leave her phone hidden in her care and the night before she’d had to detach her keys from her pepper spray because _that_ wasn’t allowed for whatever reason. She looked at the clock again; blinking a little as she realized she had misread the thing. She had killed almost two hours writing and the only reason her hands weren’t aching along with her back and left shoulder was due to how much typing she did on a daily basis. That was her theory at any rate.

A short nap wouldn’t hurt so long as she didn’t fall asleep; she could manage that, her body told her the energy drink was starting to wear off anyway. Before she could, however, a court assistant began calling names to dismiss people for a different trial date; Kindra was not one of them so while the room was now mostly empty it seemed she was still on for today. She wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. She had almost an hour for that nap; so she settled in for it. It wasn’t the most comfortable but when she stirred again the room was full of her fellow jurors waiting to meet the judge and it was ten until time. She had time to use the restroom and felt somewhat better from the nap but not fully refreshed and not even as much as she had hoped, but there was little she could do about that. It was a wonder she’d gotten any rest at all in a place like that, especially with noisy construction just outside that even the thick walls of the courthouse could not muffle.

Even when the clock read that it was time, the group still sat in wait. It was not until the clock read 34 minutes past the appointed time that things were set into motion for the next step, the selection process. Out of the 36 people in the room, only a max of 12 would be chosen. At least that was what she thought until a jury was called for a different judge than what she was told and several people got up, making her wonder if those left were part of her group or not as she only had a handful of faces she recognized from earlier.

_Blast, why must my memory for names and faces be so poor? I can remember the details of half a dozen books or aus I’ve read about not remember a name and face of someone I met in a 24 hour period._ So the wait, it seemed, would be longer; she watched another 19 minutes pass, still nothing. This was worse than waiting on a doctor or a dentist; at least those professions provided some distraction from the long wait rather than leaving the individual to their own devices and now it was 2 pm and she’d been told most got out at 4:30...

Kindra hadn’t eaten all day and while she wasn’t hungry yet - surprisingly - she knew it was only a matter of time before she did become hungry. _What's taking so long? We’ve been here nearly a full hour after we were told to be! This is stupid, juror selection shouldn’t be this long of a process! Ugh. Humans really are bad at time management sometimes... honestly. I have more productive things to do with my time than sit and wait on some stranger for a job I might not even be required to perform!_ Almost 55 minutes later another roll call was done for her group, making her wonder if **finally** things were on the move. Nope, those people were just told that they were to call-in for trials on Wednesday.

It was two and half hours after the appointed time when someone came in again; it was the bailiff again.

“I’m sorry about the waste of a day, but the case was settled. Everyone needs to call in Tuesday night after 5 pm for Wednesday's trials.” Kindra wanted to groan, why had that happened? Didn’t they have enough from the second half of the selected pool? Why would they call back the first half? That didn’t make any sense, so she gathered the meager belongings she had with her, turned in the badge and went home.


	5. Chapter 5

Kindra checked the time, she’d slept in as she’d been exhausted from the day before. What a waste of time. Seven hours only for absolutely nothing to happen. It wasn’t even noon though and she had to be at work by two so she had some time before then; she knew she’d be at work when she called in. She wasn’t sure what to expect aside from the recorded voice like before once she was on her break; she didn’t think too much on it though as she began her usual routine of checking things online, making posts on the usual forums and working a bit on the story she had started a few days ago. It was nothing out of the ordinary really and once it was time she dressed and was off to work. As a part time cashier she didn’t make a lot of money really; it was difficult to get anything but part time anywhere.

She’d tried a couple of times for an assistant position only to be rudely ignored. It had irritated her to no end and she’d been insulted each time that they didn’t seem to have the decency to tell her face-to-face she hadn’t been chosen. Instead each time she had found out had been by either seeing new faces in the position she wanted or a notification on the news board congratulating the new assistant. She wasn’t sure who exactly made these decisions but whoever it was they were clearly a rather rude individual. Kindra wasn’t thinking about this, however, as she started work.

Part of her job was to make sure product was pulled forward and was facing the correct way. Tuesdays were slow so it didn’t take her long to complete this or the other tasks she normally did aside from assisting customers in finding things or checking them out at the register. Time moved decently fast, despite the slow flow, and she soon was on her break. After using the elevator, since her left leg was out of normal commission for the day due to a strange and painful spasm of that muscle when she’d woken that morning, she limped her way to the break room and sat down. She checked the time on her phone and made a mental note of the end time of her break. She fished out the copy of her summons and called the number on the back.

“Jury members 1 to 165 are to report at 8am. Again, numbers zero zero one to zero one six five-”

“Aw fuck.” She would have to go back the following day. Wasn’t that just great? Another day off work... Kindra wasn’t happy, but there wasn’t anything she could do but inform her employers. That was a pain in and of itself to track down the right person but she had and everything was set into motion. All she could hope was that she wouldn’t have her time wasted, again.

The following day she did what she had Monday morning except she prepared better this time. She grabbed a lunch box that she put a cold tea and plus some snacks in. She made sure she was properly dressed for the weather and in nothing eye-catching either. As she was in the car and down the road she realized something, she had accidentally forgotten what was left of the energy drink she had been drinking to keep her alert for the morning. Oh well, she wasn’t going back for it as it wasn’t important. The drive was much the same as before except she accidentally went too far when trying to get to a place to park; she found a stress to do a turn around in and made it to the parking lot with no further incident. When she arrived though the jury lounge wasn’t even open, so she got out her notebook and began to write again. Not long after, fortunately, it was opened and she was able to check in. She found the softest seat she could and sat down, going back to writing again. Almost two hours later a bailiff came in.

“I’m going to call thirty-six names for Judge Scott Harpenter’s panel.” She then began listing off names, Kindra paused in her writing to listen to the list. The bailiff was nearly done when Kindra heard her name.

“Kindra Walters.”

“Here.” Well, this was it; she’d been chosen again for a panel. The bailiff continued to list off a few more names.

“If I called your name come with me.” Kindra put away her notebook, at least now she’d get to be in a courtroom again and actually be doing something rather than just sitting around. A second roll call had them lined up to enter the small room. Just as soon as everyone had sat down the bailiff opened a door.

“All rise for Judge Scott Harpenter.” Everyone stood up again.

“You may be seated.” It was like in the movies, she noted, only the judge was man about her age and the room was a lot smaller. It was only about twice the width of her apartment so some potential jurors were a little cramped on the one bench seating near the door while Kindra sat on a fold out chair in front of the juror’s box.

“You probably remember most of this from the video you watched Monday, but I’ll go over it again fairly quickly.” Hmmm, okay....

“This is going to happen in two stages-” He began to list each stage and describe it; the first was the being chosen for the panel - self explanatory - the next was juror validation. Where out of the 36 individuals there, 12 would be chosen to serve as the jury after questions from the judge and both attorneys, whom they were introduced to along with the defendant after they’d come in before the judge had arrived.

The judge then reaffirmed that questions asked were not meant to embarrass but to ensure a fair and impartial jury could be chosen and that no one should speculate why they were not chosen. The judge’s questions were a lot like the questionnaire Kindra remembered filling out Monday, they were impersonal as to only affirm that no one knew anything about the case and was not familiar with any of the people involved in the case. After that was settled, and two issues were addressed, it was the attorneys’ turn.


	6. Chapter 6

She was in a sour mood for most of the day due to having to go in yet again... This was stupid. Seriously, why not just call the second half of the pool in and leave the first half to be out until the correct passage of time had occurred again? Geeze, who thought this crap was a good idea? Humans. Creatures who thought only of themselves. Kindra didn't think that things could get worse really. Seemed neither did fate since nothing worse did happen. The time seemed to drag on for all this legal stuff, in the end she hadn't sat for a case just because she had a history and was excused from sitting as a juror for that reason. She had her time wasted and the pay wasn't even worth it. She made more in a single day than what she was paid to waste TWO days on. The only good thing about it was that she could spend the rest of the day catching up on the sleep she'd missed that day for having to be up so ridiculously early and waiting around with nothing to do for hours on end. Life went on as normal. At least she wouldn't have to worry about that nonsense again until at least two years had passed.

  
  
  
Snow. Kindra was the kind who love it. Pure, undisturbed, a coating on everything.... it was a beautiful thing. She'd been dreaming about it lately. It was odd though, even though she love snow, she couldn't place where she was in the dream she was having. It was like a forest of some kind with trees that were far taller than she was and yet the place felt like home. Oh well, it was just a dream and dreams that the mind played out when one slept weren't really things to be taken too seriously. It was almost the end of November now and she was wondering when the first snow would come. She longed for it.  
  
  
  
  
  
  


***

  
"IT'S SNOWING!" the words jerked me from my nap. what a strange dream i had been having, not that i really remember much of what it was about, just that it seemed strange. i look over at my brother before following his gaze to the window. sure enough, it is snowing. it's not a common occurrence really here in the underground. come to think of it, i'm not really sure when the last time it was that i even saw it snow. even here in snowdeep we really didn't see snow pile up like the name might suggest. heh. i love this town. my brother hates that the name is a pun, but he likes living here. 

as long as he's happy, i'm happy. it's pretty simple really. my brother is the coolest. heh... 

"Do You Remember The Last Time It Snowed?" i could only shake my head.

"sorry bro, it's been a bit too long i think." far too long. for me anyway. especially for me. the snow is something that i have a strange relationship with. seeing it makes me calm, but at the same time, sometimes seeing it makes me frustrated because of all the repeats. all i can usually think is that i've been here before... i've done this routine so many times... it's exhausting. i'm bone tired... eh heh heh... 

"Do You Think There Will Be Enough For A Snowmonster?"

"we'll have to see. even if it's not, snow problem for us." 

"Shift..." 

"after all, we're kinda just rolling in it." 

"Shift really now...."

"what? i'm having a ball here." i can't help but chuckle as he facepalms.   
"you're smiling."

"I Am And I Hate It." i knew it meant he thought it was funny. i tend to tell jokes to pass the time and such because i get bored when there's nothing to do and when days repeat end on end sometimes it's all i can do... because if you're too busy laughing then you won't have time to cry. 


End file.
